Just home from Century to Alaska (May 19 sailing)

[Italy52]

Yes, the Tracy Arm excursion offered through Celebrity was via Allen Marine. They were fantastic; our guide was personable, knowledgable, and professional. There was plenty of viewing space both inside and outside the boat. I'm only 5 ft 4 and never felt like I didn't have a great view.

 

I should also mention that while the majority of people on this excursion had booked through Celebrity, we did have two families who had booked through Allen Marine on their own (not cruise ship passengers - they were just visiting Alaska on their own), so it's possible you could end up mixed in with a cruise ship tour if it's not offered through your cruise line.

 

Tendering was no problem at all. The actual tender to shore was only about a 2 minute ride! I was expecting longer. Our ship ran tenders from both sides of the ship so it didn't seem crowded or busy at all. We docked at 2:30 and we had a 3 pm whale watching excursion booked so we were among the first groups to get off the ship, but as I said, since they were running tenders from both sides it wasn't an issue at all (keep in mind, the Century is a smaller ship so if you're going on something bigger it could be a different situation!)

 

Thanks for the quick response, I appreciate it.

[KruzPrincess]

Glad to hear you had a great time on your cruise. I'm booked on the Century later this year and have read a lot of mixed reviews. Reading this thread is good news. Do you recall if there was a decent salad bar in the buffet. I eat a lot of my meals in the buffet and like a good salad bar. I've read that there is interactive TV with free on demand movies. Is that true? I know you had a much busier itinerary and may not have watched much TV. I will have a lot of sea days on my cruise. How were the beds? I won't have a suite, so maybe bed quality differs, but I'm still wondering about your comfort. Thanks.

[Ginnyfyr]

Glad to hear you had a great time on your cruise. I'm booked on the Century later this year and have read a lot of mixed reviews. Reading this thread is good news. Do you recall if there was a decent salad bar in the buffet. I eat a lot of my meals in the buffet and like a good salad bar. I've read that there is interactive TV with free on demand movies. Is that true? I know you had a much busier itinerary and may not have watched much TV. I will have a lot of sea days on my cruise. How were the beds? I won't have a suite, so maybe bed quality differs, but I'm still wondering about your comfort. Thanks.

 

The buffet salad bar was pretty standard. On embarkation day they only offered fresh tossed caesar salads - they didn't bust out the regular salad bar until the next day. They had the usual stuff - chopped cucumbers, grape tomatoes, bell peppers, hard boiled eggs, etc. I did pop into the Aqua Spa cafe one day and their salad bar seemed to have a lot more healthy proteins (I'm not a vegetarian but I do love adding chickpeas & other beans to my salads for a change) so that might be a nice change for you to check out.

 

There were a few tv channels that showed movies but they weren't on-demand. You could order on-demand movies through the "menu" the tv but those ones all had to be paid for (the menu also allowed you to check your account, order room service & book excursions). Century also has a movie theatre (more like a small conference room with tiered movie-style seating) on deck 5, I believe, where they showed a movie twice a day. I hadn't heard of most of them but after Googling some of them when I got home, I think they were fairly recent releases (Gangster Squad & The Words come to mind)

 

I'd give our bed a 7/10. A few mornings we both woke up feeling some lower back/hip stiffness, but for the most part we were okay. In hindsight, those mornings may well have been days after we'd been walking a lot the day before, so maybe the fault was with our bodies and not the bed, lol. Overall I'd say we slept pretty well though.

[ChefPeg]

Thank you for sharing your info on the Century. We are sailing a coastal on her in September. It's been a while since we sailed Celebrity so any info you share is well appreciated. We are a little concerned with her ahe and need for a refurb but it soundslike she is okay.

 

Welcome home! Alaska is an amazing place.

[DiamondSuiteCruiser]

Thank you so much for sharing, and happy to hear you had a wonderful time. We are also booked on the Century 3 months from now, and I too had concerns after reading some of the reviews. Thanks again!

 

Gina

[KruzPrincess]

The buffet salad bar was pretty standard. On embarkation day they only offered fresh tossed caesar salads - they didn't bust out the regular salad bar until the next day. They had the usual stuff - chopped cucumbers, grape tomatoes, bell peppers, hard boiled eggs, etc. I did pop into the Aqua Spa cafe one day and their salad bar seemed to have a lot more healthy proteins (I'm not a vegetarian but I do love adding chickpeas & other beans to my salads for a change) so that might be a nice change for you to check out.

 

There were a few tv channels that showed movies but they weren't on-demand. You could order on-demand movies through the "menu" the tv but those ones all had to be paid for (the menu also allowed you to check your account, order room service & book excursions). Century also has a movie theatre (more like a small conference room with tiered movie-style seating) on deck 5, I believe, where they showed a movie twice a day. I hadn't heard of most of them but after Googling some of them when I got home, I think they were fairly recent releases (Gangster Squad & The Words come to mind)

 

I'd give our bed a 7/10. A few mornings we both woke up feeling some lower back/hip stiffness, but for the most part we were okay. In hindsight, those mornings may well have been days after we'd been walking a lot the day before, so maybe the fault was with our bodies and not the bed, lol. Overall I'd say we slept pretty well though.

 

Thanks for responding. All good information. Glad you had a good time.

[Ginnyfyr]

Well, I never got around to doing a proper review like I'd hoped....work has been busy, busy, busy since my return and non-work life is equally busy. If anyone is interested in seeing my photos, here is the public link to my Facebook album:

 

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151378247281222.1073741830.622421221&type=1&l=7e9029d84b

 

I plan to switch it back to 'friends only' viewing at the end of July so hopefully you'll have all checked it out by then. For those of you with upcoming cruises booked on the Century, I really wouldn't worry at all about her condition. Unless you're wandering about with white gloves and a magnifying glass, I don't think you'll find anything to complain about - who could, with all that amazing scenery to enjoy!

[ChefPeg]

Well, I never got around to doing a proper review like I'd hoped....work has been busy, busy, busy since my return and non-work life is equally busy. If anyone is interested in seeing my photos, here is the public link to my Facebook album:

 

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151378247281222.1073741830.622421221&type=1&l=7e9029d84b

 

I plan to switch it back to 'friends only' viewing at the end of July so hopefully you'll have all checked it out by then. For those of you with upcoming cruises booked on the Century, I really wouldn't worry at all about her condition. Unless you're wandering about with white gloves and a magnifying glass, I don't think you'll find anything to complain about - who could, with all that amazing scenery to enjoy!

 

Thank you for sharing your FB pictures with us. I really enjoyed them. And more importantly....for easing my mind sailing on Century.We just made final payment on our upcoming coastal in September and I was almost ready to cancel but...We discussed it and know we will make the best of it....even if its on an old rust bucket,lol. Thanks again!

[Ginnyfyr]

Thank you for sharing your FB pictures with us. I really enjoyed them. And more importantly....for easing my mind sailing on Century.We just made final payment on our upcoming coastal in September and I was almost ready to cancel but...We discussed it and know we will make the best of it....even if its on an old rust bucket,lol. Thanks again!

 

Glad you enjoyed the pics! She's far from an old rust bucket...maybe a partial one, lol. I highly recommend enjoying at least one dinner at Murano - I was not interested in dining there at all but my hubby convinced me to try it (he's much more of a fine dining type than I am) and I fell in love with the place. Excellent service and food - a lovely splurge!

[KruzPrincess]

Thanks for sharing your pictures.

[ChefPeg]

Glad you enjoyed the pics! She's far from an old rust bucket...maybe a partial one, lol. I highly recommend enjoying at least one dinner at Murano - I was not interested in dining there at all but my hubby convinced me to try it (he's much more of a fine dining type than I am) and I fell in love with the place. Excellent service and food - a lovely splurge!

 

I agree......she is not a rust bucket.....your lovely pics proves it. I will definitely try Murano.....thank you for the suggestion.

[redlady62]

Thank you for sharing your photos. We will be on the Century in September for the last Alaska Cruise of the season. This will be our 3rd trip to Alaska (2nd time by cruise ship) How did you get to the bow of the ship for your glacier visit? I do not recall it being available 3 yrs ago when we were on the Mercury.... or perhaps we needed a special pass word!? ;). We are debating about Murano, were there any promotions for this venue? We will be a party of 3.

 

As you can see from my location, we reside near you... I hope you did not have any issue with the storm that came through last night.

 

Sue >M<

[lovecruzin]

I am just now looking at your pictures, Luna must have been your stateroom attendant? We had the same surprises waiting for us when we got back to our room each night! :)

[dwp1127]

We just got off the Century about an hour ago (just relaxing in our hotel in Vancouver right now catching up on my internet addiction :-) We had Room 1205 (which is right next to the room the OP had in 1207) and Luna was in fact the stateroom attendant for us.

 

I was laughing looking at the photos posted because we had many of the same nightly towel creations. She scared the heck out of me two nights ago when she decided to do two legs in my wife's sneakers attached to the toiled. Definitely wasn't expecting to walk in on that!

 

Ram was our Butler also, who was just truly awesome. Wish we could have brought him home with us!

 

I am just now looking at your pictures, Luna must have been your stateroom attendant? We had the same surprises waiting for us when we got back to our room each night! :)

[dwp1127]

We just got off the Century today, we were able to get within 1/2 a mile of Hubbard Glacier, the weather was perfectly clear and outstanding. They opened up the "Helipad even though we don't have one" (as Ben the Cruise Director put it). Everyone was able to access it through the Celebrity Theater on Deck 6/7, they made a general announcement for anyone who wanted to go out there. We opted to stay on our Verandah, we were watching the bow on the in-room TV Ch 19 and it was pretty crowded.

 

Thank you for sharing your photos. We will be on the Century in September for the last Alaska Cruise of the season. This will be our 3rd trip to Alaska (2nd time by cruise ship) How did you get to the bow of the ship for your glacier visit? I do not recall it being available 3 yrs ago when we were on the Mercury.... or perhaps we needed a special pass word!? ;). We are debating about Murano, were there any promotions for this venue? We will be a party of 3.

 

As you can see from my location, we reside near you... I hope you did not have any issue with the storm that came through last night.

 

Sue >M<

[dwp1127]

We had both Lunch and Dinner at Murano. $25 per head. No promotions. It was (to us) absolutely worth the money, even with a generous tip, it was still cheaper than anything we would have gotten at that quality/level back home in New York. It wasn't very busy either time we were there.

 

If you do go, ask specifically for Carlos (from Portugal). He truly made it an outstanding experience for us and was the life of that restaurant.

 

We are debating about Murano, were there any promotions for this venue? We will be a party of 3.

[lovecruzin]

We just got off the Century about an hour ago (just relaxing in our hotel in Vancouver right now catching up on my internet addiction :-) We had Room 1205 (which is right next to the room the OP had in 1207) and Luna was in fact the stateroom attendant for us.

 

I was laughing looking at the photos posted because we had many of the same nightly towel creations. She scared the heck out of me two nights ago when she decided to do two legs in my wife's sneakers attached to the toiled. Definitely wasn't expecting to walk in on that!

 

Ram was our Butler also, who was just truly awesome. Wish we could have brought him home with us!

 

 

My husband is the one who found the creation in the bathroom, he thought we were in the wrong cabin. :)

Ram was not our butler but we talked to him frequently, such a nice man. Our cruise ended a month ago and I still miss the people (crew) we met onboard!

[232271]

Formal nights were Monday (sea day) and Thursday (Juneau). As we lucked out with a beautiful, sunny, 70 degree day in Juneau, we decided to skip formal night and dine at a local restaurant (Twisted Fish - very good!) so we could make the most of our day in Juneau.

 

The Tracy Arm trip was so incredible...I'm so glad we decided to go. I had wanted to book the excursion from the get-go, but was swayed by some posters in the Alaska forum who advised we might not be able to get up to the glacier so early in the season. We had booked the dog sled puppy camp excursion instead, but when our on-board naturalist mentioned he was doing the trip and it was the first time it was offered this season, we jumped at the chance to give it a shot. We figured at the very least, we might get to see some cool wildlife even if we couldn't get close to the glacier. Our expectations were exceeded X 1000! On the way to the glacier we spotted 2 humpback whales, had a sea lion swimming alongside our boat, and came upon a bunch of bald eagles chillin out on icebergs - one of which appeared to have just snagged itself a crab out of the water! Once inside Tracy Arm we saw another humpback - I knew it was something special when even our guide was blown away and said he'd never seen a humpback in there! Closer to the glacier we saw a few seals floating on ice chunks, but once we actually got closer we came upon hundreds of them laying right by the glacier! It was totally breathtaking to see so many of them in their natural habitat, and then that big beautiful glacier behind them...it was almost too much to process at once. Our visit was capped off with some pretty cool calving which was so incredible to witness. We also stopped at north sawyer glacier which didn't have any wildlife around it but was equally stunning. We spent probably 20 minutes there before heading back to Juneau. Lunch was provided (turkey wrap, bottled water, apple, homemade cookies & a bag of chips - you could also buy beer, wine, or soft drinks). On our way back we had another sea lion come along for a swim and saw a few more bald eagles. To say this was the highlight of our trip is the understatement of the year, lol. It was worth every penny of the $224 a person cost - I would've happily paid twice that given the experience we had!

 

I'm having a heck of a time getting my photos to load & store properly on both Google+ and Facebook but am hopeful that it'll be sorted out by the weekend so I can start sharing some of them on here!

 

where did you board the boat for the TRACY ARM excursion? did you get off the century first then reboard the smaller boat or did it pick you up from the ship??